Treaty of Waitangi
The Treaty of Waitangi was signed in 1840 in two versions that do not say the same thing. Britain had resisted annexing New Zealand for years and changed its mind because of what was happening without it: some 2,000 settlers, whaling stations, land bought from Māori by speculators on documents nobody could enforce, and a French colonising expedition on its way. William Hobson was sent to obtain sovereignty by consent. The document was drafted in English in a few days and translated overnight by a missionary, Henry Williams, and his son. The English text has the chiefs ceding sovereignty absolutely. The Māori text uses kāwanatanga, a transliteration of governorship, for what is ceded, and guarantees the chiefs tino rangatiratanga — full chiefly authority — over their lands and treasures, which in Māori is the stronger word. Some 540 chiefs signed, most of them the Māori version. What followed was land: the Crown's pre-emption right, the wars of the 1860s in Taranaki and the Waikato, the confiscation of some 1.2 million hectares from tribes declared to be in rebellion, and a Native Land Court that converted communal title into individual shares that could be sold piecemeal. A judge ruled in 1877 that the treaty was a simple nullity. The Waitangi Tribunal was established in 1975 to hear claims, given retrospective jurisdiction in 1985, and has produced settlements, apologies and a body of law built on the difference between the two texts. It is now treated as New Zealand's founding document and as a partnership rather than a cession, which is close to what the Māori text says and a long way from what the Crown believed it had obtained. Waitangi Day is the national holiday and is regularly the occasion for protest.
- Year: 1840 CE
- Category: Diplomatic
